From the archives: One of the things that is often neglected on Martin Luther King day is his dedication to economic justice. What is forgotten–often willfully–is that he was an advocate for racial and economic justice. From a speech he gave to striking sanitation workers in Memphis on March 18, 1968 (italics mine):

Recently, a McCain campaign spokescritter used the phrase ‘real’ Virginian. Anyone who has lived in the South has heard the phrase ‘real Southerner’ before. What’s despicable about that phrase is that it always refers to white Southerners–African-Americans are completely marginalized and ignored in the definition of a Southerner as if they don’t exist. Given the…